NAME

String::Dump::Debugging - String debugging tips with String::Dump

VERSION

This document describes String::Dump version 0.06.

DESCRIPTION

This document is a collection of tips for debugging Unicode and encoded strings using String::Dump.

Literal strings

When dumping literal strings in your code, use the utf8 pragma when strings of Unicode characters are desired and don’t use it or disable it when series of bytes are desired. The pragma may also be lexically enabled or disabled.

use utf8;

{
    no utf8;
    say dump_hex('Ĝis! ☺');  # C4 9C 69 73 21 20 E2 98 BA
}

say dump_hex('Ĝis! ☺');  # 11C 69 73 21 20 263A

Command-line input and filehandles

The simplest way to ensure that you’re working with strings of characters from all of your basic sources of input is to use the utf8::all pragma. This extends the utf8 pragma to automatically convert command-line arguments provided by @ARGV, user-defined filehandles, as well as STDIN, among others.

Other sources of input

To handle strings provided by other sources of input, such as from network protocols or a web server request, pass the value to Encode::decode_utf8, which will return the desired string.

use Encode;

say dump_hex( decode_utf8($string) );

To convert a variable in-place, pass it to utf8::decode instead.

utf8::decode($string);

say dump_hex($string);

AUTHOR

Nick Patch <patch@cpan.org>

COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE

© 2011–2012 Nick Patch

This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.